How can I get quicken to run faster?

mbrown20

I use Quicken Premier. My Qdata.qdf file is 269kb and lately it has been taking up to 10 seconds to go from one account (my checking) to another (an investment) and also a long time to post a downloaded transaction. Is there anything that can be done to speed up these activities? I have been using Quicken since 1996 and don't want to lose access to any history.

Jim_Harman

I assume that is 269 MB.

Go to Tools > Account list and click on Options. Select Show number of transactions if it is not already checked.

How many transactions are in the investment account?

mbrown20

When I looked at the file in file mgr it says 269,054 KB.
Number of transactions are 16,139. There are 27 investment accounts

Jim_Harman

OK, 269,000 KB is 269 MB, which is a large file. Have you been using attachments? They will consume a lot of space.

Also 16,000 transactions in one investing account will likely slow down that account.

One option to consider is archiving the transactions. This will move the transactions that correspond to securities you no longer hold to a new archive account. Because the active account will generally have many fewer transactions after the move, it should perform significantly better. All of your history will still be in the data file.

To do the archive, first back up your data file in case you do not like the result, then click the gear at the top right of the account and pick the Archive transactions option. Read the instructions carefully.

If you decide to try the archive, please let us know how many transactions are in the active account after archiving and measure the before and after speed, to help us advise other users.

mbrown20

There are 29 individual accounts in investment. Does that change your answer? Also once archived are transactions still available?

Jim_Harman

The total number of investing accounts is not an issue, it is the number of transactions in each account. Did you look up the number of transactions in the Account List as I requested above? How many transactions are there in the account that is performing slowly?

Once an account is archived, the transactions for securities you no longer hold in that account are in the archive account.

Note that this process is different from Quicken's Year end archive, which creates a separate file and only affects banking accounts. 

mbrown20

All the accounts a performing as I stated. Is the archive account accessible to view and report on should I need information? The transaction number was for the sum of all accounts. The account with the highest number has 3400 transactions.
What else could be slowing things down?

Rocket J Squirrel

Yes, the archived transactions are still available. Try archiving in a copy of your file.

You can also try tweaking Windows settings. These two Win10 graphics settings might help a bit. Your PC may or may not support them.

Ps56k2

just for grins  - you can also look and compare your overall Quicken file stats -

.... Help --> CTRL+About Quicken